By Nicole Veneto

The Substance is the most insane midnight movie you’ll see in a multiplex in 2024. Needless to say, I loved it.

The Substance, directed by Coralie Fargeat. Screening at Kendall Square Cinema, Coolidge Corner Theatre, AMC Assembly Row 12 and other movie houses in New England.

Aging actress Elisabeth Sparkle (Demi Moore) takes a long, hard look at herself before taking The Substance. Photo: Mubi

Approved for medical use in 2017, the medication semaglutide — brand name Ozempic — was developed to improve glycemic control and assist with weight management for type 2 diabetes. Its active ingredient is GLP-1, a hormone found in the small intestine that stimulates insulin secretion and simulates feeling full. Of course, diabetes treatment isn’t why Ozempic has become the drug of choice for the rich, famous, and suddenly very slender. Celebrities like Oprah, Kelly Clarkson, and Rebel Wilson have publicly credited Ozempic injections with their drastic weight loss. Little has been said of its side effects, likely because the weight loss is the side effect for its intended use.

I’m not getting any younger. My 40s are now closer in sight than my adolescence. If I’m mistaken for younger, it’s because of the rigorous upkeep most women are intimately familiar with. I bleach and dye my hair to cover the grays. I have a skincare regimen, slathering myself in retinol, collagen, and snail mucus. I go to the gym at least twice a week in an effort to stay fit and toned. They say women “hit the wall” at 30, and as I inch closer to 40, the pressure is mounting to stave off wrinkles, varicose veins, and white hairs for as long as possible. All of this, I’m well aware, will ultimately be for naught.

It’s from that perspective that I watched The Substance, the buzzy second feature from Coralie Fargeat and winner for this year’s Best Screenplay prize at Cannes. Her debut, 2017’s Revenge, stands as one of the great rape revenge movies of the last decade, placing the predatory male gaze and the rape culture it manifests in the literal crosshairs. I felt Revenge never got its fair due in the post-#MeToo landscape, grossly overshadowed by its feckless evil double Promising Young Woman several years later. It seems Fargeat finally has a real breakthrough on her hands: The Substance is the most insane midnight movie you’ll see in a multiplex in 2024. Needless to say, I loved it.

Once upon a time, daytime aerobics instructor Elisabeth Sparkle (former Brat Packer Demi Moore, whose role here takes on a metatextual quality) was a bright and shiny young actress. Like her now cracked star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, Lizzie’s long past her prime at 50. At least that’s the justification network executive Harvey (a toothy Dennis Quaid clad in a variety of ostentatious suits, currently playing Ronald Reagan in a theater down the hall) supplies when he fires her. This is where the titular Substance comes in, a black market treatment that literally births (from the spine) a better, younger version of Elisabeth named Sue (2024 MVP Margaret Qualley) to relive her youthful glory days. But, as with any fairy tale elixir, strict rules must be followed: activate your other self only once, maintain the other self with an injection every day, and switch off every seven days to maintain balance. What could go wrong? Let’s just say a misuse of the Substance culminates in a final hour so jaw droppingly nasty that Mubi should have rolled out barf bags for its marketing campaign.

From its themes to its visuals, there’s nothing subtle about The Substance. It insists upon itself because it has to. The culture of misogyny that drives women to try to satisfy unattainable beauty standards has never been subtle. We are pitted against each other in a vicious attention economy whose currency is our own image. Fargeat’s vision is clear and confident: she up-cycles concepts from her early short Reality+ (augmented appearances, a sutured spine). The director employs the same wry recreation of the male gaze from Revenge, framing women’s bodies like Big Mac glamour shots. In this film, though, Fargeat and cinematographer Benjamin Kracun (who ironically also shot Promising Young Woman) are out to drown you, to the point of desensitization, in images of lithe limbs, tight asses, and perky breasts. But the real star of the show is the makeup effects. Not since the heydays of Rob Bottin, Screaming Mad George, and Rick Baker has a film reveled so enthusiastically in the art of grossing you out.

At this point, I’d like to appraise some of the online commentary. Some are suggesting that there has been a vast discrepancy of reactions between male and female audiences regarding the film — that the fervent input from men greatly overshadows the supposedly tepid ones from women. I find that observation to be both gender essentialist and blatantly untrue. There are plenty of female critics who have come out in support of The Substance. The fact is, film criticism still skews heavily male, which would explain much of this supposed gender gap. Besides, the reactions of film critics often do not reflect the responses of regular movie-going audiences. My theater was packed with men and women alike, cringing and shrieking with horrified delight. And if men find themselves enjoying a film made by a woman explicitly about a very feminine ordeal, is that really a mark against Fargeat? I would call it a strength.

There is no right or wrong way for women to process their anxieties about aging. Women are not a monolith, and neither are the ways we deal with our bodies. I find body horror to be an effective means of conveying the dysmorphic relationships women have with themselves. Pushing the boundaries of the grotesque and the abject, plowing into extremes, creates an incredible catharsis. None of this is to say that The Substance is immune from criticism. Considering how hard the film leans into “hagsploitation” with Moore’s Cronenbergian transformation, I understand why some women would hate it or feel it’s making a horrifying spectacle of the aging female body. But is this not the fun house mirror image women fear they will turn into? For all its gory absurdity, The Substance is underscored by tragedy; Elisabeth’s gradual deterioration and the war she and Sue wage against each other are pointed manifestations of our own self loathing. It’s fun to watch the blood geysers and vestigial appendages take up the screen, yet my primary feeling as the credits rolled was sadness.

Much of my summer was taken up by a self image crisis: do people (i.e., men) actually like me and respect my work, or do they keep me around because I’m a pretty — and young — woman? What will happen when I cease to be seen as desirable? How much of my career hinges on how I’m viewed by men? The world seems to know this already, which is probably why I’m being advertised a new drug called “hers” on social media. A closer look at the fine print reveals the active ingredient to be none other than GLP-1. The Substance exists and has existed in many forms. For as long as women are subjugated to the beauty standards set by the patriarchy, we will be injecting and ingesting some variation of the Substance into ourselves.

Nicole Veneto graduated from Brandeis University with an MA in Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies, concentrating on feminist media studies. Her writing has been featured in MAI Feminism & Visual Culture, Film Matters Magazine, and Boston University’s Hoochie Reader. She’s the co-host of the podcast Marvelous! Or, the Death of Cinema. You can follow her on Letterboxd and her podcast on Twitter @MarvelousDeath.